Look to the Sky and You'll Find Me
by ThatThingCalledLoveContest
Summary: Bella wasn't angry with Edward. She never could be, even after he left her with nothing but a letter as a reminder of the person he had been to her. She now understood him. But even then, living without him would be the hardest thing she would ever do.


**Look to the Sky and You'll Find Me**

~*~*~*~ 

"_Without a wish, without a will,_

_I stood upon that silent hill_

_And stared into the sky until_

_My eyes were blind with stars and still_

_I stared into the sky."_

Ralph Hodgson

~*~*~*~

Prisms of light danced across the waxy reds and yellows that decorated each tree. The tiny veins within the fluttering appendages absorbed the luminous rays, their cells drinking in the last warmth of life. Twirling and spinning in lazy circles, one leaf stood out amongst the rest, its bright green summer still mixed with the rich red fall. It was alone and far too slow in catching up with the autumn rainbow of the tree.

And so it took flight, breaking off from the home that was its anchor, floating along the chilled currents of the air. As it made its descent towards the rocky cliff below, it found a lone figure sitting silently, watching as twilight painted the sky in a brilliant crimson haze.

The leaf spun around her coffee hair and chocolate eyes, catching her attention as it finally fell beside of her foot.

She picked it up, twirling the smooth stem between her fingers. Her gaze moved to the glittering sun as it passed behind the darkening clouds. She felt the slow cascade of warm salty fluid littering her cheeks.

If things had turned out differently, maybe she wouldn't be so alone. Carefully, she reached inside the pocket of her sweatshirt, her palm enclosing around the crinkled piece of paper there.

And she wept.

~*~*~

_Four months earlier…_

"That looks pretty gross, Bells."

Jacob Black leaned over his best friend's shoulder, inspecting the brown goo that she stirred so vigilantly in her small kitchen. His nose wrinkled in disgust.

An open bag of chocolate chips sat on the edge of the counter and he reached for it, intent on stealing a few of the sweet morsels.

Bella smacked at his hand. "That's because it's not baked yet."

Knowing that the smack hurt her more than it did him, Jacob quickly snatched the bag away from her before she had a chance to swat at him again. Grinning, he popped a few chocolate chips in his mouth. "Bella, do you even know what that reminds me of?"

"It's brownie mix, Jake," Bella sighed, grabbing the bag out of his hand. She took a handful of the chips and dumped them into the batter.

"Bella, I have several names for what that looks like and trust me, "brownie mix" isn't one of them."

"You still eat the brownies, Jake!" She huffed in her frustration, slamming the yellow Toll House bag on the counter. It crinkled loudly as a few chips spilled onto the linoleum. Ignoring the small mess, Bella continued to stir the mixture, a look of concentration embedded in her pale face.

Jacob frowned from where he stood, his back resting against the edge of the counter, arms crossed over his broad chest. "Bells," he murmured, watching the way she scowled at the batter as she whipped it more furiously. Though she did not acknowledge him.

"Bella." He reached out to touch her arm, the pads of his fingers rough against her skin. "It's okay."

She stopped then and looked up at him, her eyes wide and innocent. "How can you be so sure?"

The front door opened loudly, banging back against the wall. "Someone want to come over here and help two old farts?"

Blinking back unshed tears, Bella grabbed a pan from the cabinet as Jacob ran towards Charlie and Billy. Charlie bent his elbow out to stop the door from hitting them both as he backed Billy's wheelchair into the house. Two boxes of pizza sat in Billy's warm hands. He smiled up at his son as Jacob took their dinner and helped Charlie close the door.

"Hope you two weren't too bored while we were gone."

Jacob eyed his friend warily as the three of them entered the kitchen. He didn't miss the way Charlie cleared his throat awkwardly at the sight of his emotionally distressed daughter.

Turning around from where she now stood in front of the oven, Bella smiled, though the sentiment barely reached her eyes. "We were fine, Billy. I'm actually just putting a pan of brownies in the oven. They should be done as soon as we're finished eating the pizza."

She was about to turn away from them, the muscles around her lips already tired from trying so hard, but the faint sound of her father's voice caught her attention.

"Thanks, Bells."

When she turned around, Charlie was already wheeling Billy up to the kitchen table as Jacob set paper plates down for them all. It was comforting. Easy. They moved fluidly, not having to cope with such trials that had assaulted her very existence.

And as she watched them, a deep sadness surrounding her heart, she wished that life could be so simple.

~*~*~

"_You know, if you kick me one more time in your sleep, I may have to tickle you mercilessly."_

_His voice, coated in exotic spices that flowed through her nerves, fired off electrical sparks that sent her skin humming with life. She smiled, though her eyes remained shut, and kicked._

_Nimble, cold fingers danced along her sides, making her giggle and squirm in her bed beside him. Knowing that resounding squeals were sure to escape her lips, Bella turned her face into her pillow as soon as the high-pitched sounds echoed in the night._

"_Now, that simply won't do," he chided, pulling her pillow out from underneath her._

_Breathless, the flyaway strands of her hair fluttering past her eyes, Bella looked up at him in shock as he continued to tickle her. "Edward! How… am…" She laughed. "I… supposed to stop… laugh…" Another sharp squeal left her full lips. "…ing!"_

_His hands were suddenly in her hair, his fingers threading through the silky strands as he pulled her face to his, silencing her jubilant voice with a kiss. When he pulled away to stare into her cinnamon depths, her lids half closed, he smiled and lightly ghosted his lips over hers once more. "Like this."_

The memory vanished from her mind, disappearing in the midnight shadows that moved across her room. She hugged her knees to her chest as her gaze fell on the empty spot on her dresser where their picture used to be. A tear slid from the corner of her eye as she remembered what it felt like the first time she came back to her room to find that every trace of him was gone.

"_It'll be as if I never existed."_

That phrase haunted her being, her ghost-like body, so frail and devoid of nourishment that her skin was almost translucent.

"Edward," she whispered as her fingers dug into the sides of her knees more roughly. She sniffed once… twice… Her body began to rock back and forth quietly as the tears flowed freely down her smooth cheeks. She could taste the salt on the tip of her tongue. "Edward," she murmured again. Her eyes flitted from one dark corner of her room to the next. "Please…" she whimpered, burying her face in her knees as her body shook.

His name fell from her lips repeatedly, intermingling with the liquid sadness that dripped from her chin and stained the gray fabric of her pants. Silently, she hoped that the night wind outside would catch her pleas and carry them to the one she longed for the most.

~*~*~

"Logarithms."

A resounding groan filtered through the small classroom as the students opened their books to the chapter for the day.

Bella sat in the back, her eyes cast down.

Mr. Clemens, the new calculus teacher, walked slowly back and forth at the front of the room. His eyes searched every face that made up his pupils. "Who can tell me the log of 10?"

Students raised their hands and for the next fifteen minutes, Bella felt herself drift away from the present and back into a time where life didn't consist of logarithms. Life was simple division and any addition equation was as easy as one plus one equals two.

She heard a familiar hum ringing in her ears…

"_I could help you if you wanted."_

_Her fingers poked and prodded at the calculator as she typed in an equation, and each time a groan of frustration would leave her lips when her parabola ended up as a long curve. "Stupid piece of – "_

"_Like I said," he insisted. She looked up into his honeycomb eyes, swirling with amusement, and scowled. "I can help you if you'd like."_

"_I can do it on my own, thank you." Bella punched in her quadratic formula and cursed aloud when her graph took on the shape of a sharp 'v.'_

_A bemused chuckle echoed across the kitchen table and Bella grabbed the black mechanical box and hurled it in his direction. _

_Edward caught it of course, but it didn't seem to erase the crooked grin from his lips. "Sweet Bella," he sighed. "You love me in ways no one else has."_

_Crossing her arms, the pale brunette frowned at him, her chocolate eyes swimming in silent fury. "I envy your knowledge sometimes, you know. Why are these important anyway? It's not like I'll ever use this again."_

_The calculator made a dull thud as he placed it on the table, and before she could look up, Edward was kneeling before her, his eyes studying her face as if she were a form of art created from DaVinci himself. "Mathematics is in everything we do. There are equations that make up the shape of our eyes," he whispered, ghosting his fingers lightly over her lids until they fell closed. "They even calculate how far we can see." His fingertips feathered lightly over her skin, trailing down her face to follow the fluid motion of her curves. "They formulate the lines in our brow, the curve of our temple, our cheeks…" Slowly his thumb traced her bottom lip. "Even here." _

_Bella sucked in a sharp breath and when she felt his frozen lips hover over hers, the beating of her heart picked up in a symphony of stuttering notes and falling chords. "Yes," he whispered, placing a hand over her chest. "They're here too."_

_Her eyes still closed, she pushed her forehead against his and sighed. _

_His lips lightly rubbed against hers as he whispered her name. "I love you, my sweet, beautiful Bella."_

"Miss Swan."

Startled, Bella glanced up at Mr. Clemens, her wide brown eyes embarrassed. "Yes?"

As all teachers who have caught their students daydreaming, Mr. Clemens smiled delightedly at his chance to prove to his students that they should always pay attention. "What is the log of forty multiplied by two?"

She stared at him blankly and felt the slow rise of blood rushing to her cheeks as twenty pairs of eyes turned to watch her. "I… I don't know."

"No?"

Dumbly, she shook her head. "No."

Mr. Clemens scolded her behavior silently as he looked down at her for a few moments. "Miss Mallory? Can you tell me what the log of forty multiplied by two is?"

Bella watched as the girl with the bottled blonde hair, typed away in her calculator. Her answer was on the tip of her tongue in less than thirty seconds. And as Mr. Clemens appraised her and demeaned Bella by not paying attention, Bella merely scooped her books up in her arms and stood.

She looked up at Mr. Clemens, his small green eyes shocked. "Miss Swan?"

Without saying a word, she walked down the row of desks and turned for the classroom door.

"Miss Swan, where are you going?"

But she didn't reply. The door closed softly behind her, signaling her goodbye.

~*~*~

Yellow light danced across her ceiling as the shadows of the leaves moved outside her window.

A soft knock resounded from the other side of her door and Bella beckoned in the intrusion with a soft sigh.

"The school called me today," Charlie said, walking over to the foot of her bed.

Bella's eyes moved with the quivering shadows, lost.

"Mind telling me why you left so early?"

"Wasn't feeling well."

A sigh escaped him and Charlie rubbed the back of his neck, tired of hearing her excuses but too forgiving to be mad with her. "Bells, you can't keep doing this."

"Doing what?" she asked, her gaze finally locking on his. "I haven't skipped class before."

"I know," he nodded, slowly lowering himself to perch on the end of her bed. He grimaced at the bright purple comforter before continuing. "You need to stop hiding away. I hate to see you like this."

"I'll be fine." It was her automatic response to everything. She was programmed to ignore the withering girl she had become. "I'll be fine," she repeated again.

Charlie turned to her then, his dark mahogany eyes weary. As the chief of police he was trained to protect others, but how could he protect his little girl from herself? "Are you sure about that?"

Refusing to meet his gaze, she nodded. "Yes. I'll be fine."

~*~*~

Life was stale. It crumbled to dust in her bare hands; white, chalky powder that swirled into tiny particles when the air blew. Day after day, week after week, and still she had not seen any trace of him. For a while, she thought that it was all in her head.

"Edward Cullen is not real," she would whisper harshly, her eyes tightly shut.

Yet, her heart told her otherwise and everyday she walked alone, her body hollow and empty inside.

The infinitesimal cells that flowed through her blood shriveled into nothing. The fluid that was meant to give her life only gave her a torturous, slow death.

One night she dreamt of not her death, but his. It frightened her so much that she fell out of bed, causing her wrist to bend in a way that it was not meant to as she attempted to stop her collision with the cold floor.

A single tear had slipped down her cheek, then.

"_Bella, why must you insist on being so stubborn?"_

_She was on her bedroom floor, holding her ankle where a deep purple bruise began to form. Charlie was at the station and she had no one there to help her. After several failed attempts to get the phone that sat by her bed, she finally called Edward._

_He gingerly touched the stained skin, his fingers delicately brushing against her._

"_It's not my fault that the top stairs were made unevenly," she huffed, wincing when he turned her foot over. _

_He grimaced and immediately began massaging her calf in a comforting manner. "Sorry."_

_She watched the look of concentration on his porcelain face, the troubling concern in his tawny eyes…_ _"It's okay."_

_To Edward, he was a vampire, a monstrous being that threatened humankind every day. But to Bella, he was only an innocent seventeen-year-old boy with cinnamon hair and goldenrod eyes._

"_I should have stayed with you today," he murmured. His hands were like ice against her aching bones. It was nice._

_Bella shook her head. "Edward, it's fine. You know my coordination skills are nothing to be proud of."_

"_I could have prevented this from happening."_

"_But you're here now," she said, her small hands grabbing the sides of his face, full of mythological beauty. He looked up at her, guilty. "Think of what would have happened if you weren't here? I would have had to call Charlie and he would freak out, as usual, and send me to the hospital."_

"_I'm not so sure you don't have to go there, Bella," he murmured. "You did a number on your ankle."_

_Sighing, she bent forward until her forehead rested against his. "It's nothing that a little ice can't fix. Besides, you're here. That's all that matters to me."_

_For a few moments, Edward seemed physically pained. The lines in his face were etched deeply into his skin. Slowly his hands came up around her back and he gently pulled her into his lap. "My sweet Bella," he whispered into her hair, his chilled breath tickling her skin. "I already miss you."_

His words had made little sense to her then but they wrapped around her heart with perfect clarity now, squeezing the muscled organ until the life drained away from her flesh.

And a few moments later, as the bright square lights of Forks Hospital moved over her head, she realized just how empty she truly was. Because it was her father at her side, helping her into the emergency room, instead of Edward sitting beside of her in bed, kissing away the pain that scorched her wrist. He would have taken her to Carlisle and the problem would have been solved in minutes. Now she would sit in the stark white building with its bleach-tainted air and wish for the next six hours that she was back at home, dreaming of a time that had become so foreign in her life.

By the time that they had returned home, it was already time for Charlie to head over to the station. He made sure that Bella stayed in bed for the remainder of the day and called the school to inform them that she would not be in. Though Bella complained, he would hear none of it. Instead, he had Sue Clearwater come over to check on her in the afternoon. She brought over a container of homemade beef stew, which Bella greedily ate.

Later that afternoon she fell into a fitful sleep. Dreams of auburn hair and snow-white skin swirling through her mind.

"_I promise you that you'll never see me again."_

_She felt like her soul had withered away, slowly leaving her body as he stepped in front of her. His lips touched the pale skin across her forehead and her heart clenched with sorrow as she felt a thousand lifetimes slipping away. "Edward," she whimpered, her thin fingers curling around the fabric of his shirt. "Please… don't do this."_

"_Goodbye."_

She woke screaming only to find that a pair of strong arms had wrapped around her. The musty scent of her father engulfed her senses and he squeezed her tighter, unsure of what to say as she cried freely into his shoulder.

~*~*~

"Bella, have you seen that receipt?" Charlie sat at the kitchen table, a beer in hand, as he went through the most recent bank statement he had received in the mail.

She knew it wasn't in her room, but she decided to look there anyway as she had looked through every other place in the house. "Still looking, Dad!" she called out.

Her injured wrist was set in a cast but she was still able to pull out her desk drawer with the other hand and rifle through its contents. As she paged through old birthday cards and several week old coupons for Barnes and Noble, she accidentally knocked over a folded piece of paper. It fell to the floor beside her foot and she peered down at it curiously.

The paper was thick and rough to the touch as she picked it up, its edges slightly frayed and tea stained as if it had seen years beyond her life. When she opened it, her soft mahogany eyes focused in on the tidy scrawl that littered the page in a handwriting that was not her own. It belonged to a love that she would never see again.

Fleeting moments passed by as the minute hand on the clock downstairs ticked idly away. Charlie took a swig of his beer and sighed at the numbers and dollar signs that were printed so boldly in front of him. "Bells, did you find it yet?" he called out.

But there was no answer.

Assuming she had not heard him, he repeated his question again, this time a bit louder. "Bella? Did you find the receipt?"

It was hard to say how much time had ticked by when a loud thud smacked against the floor overhead. Blood racing to his heart, Charlie jumped out of his chair, knocking it to the floor in his haste to get up to his only daughter.

The sight that met his frantic eyes sent him to his knees.

Bella, her warm chocolate hair framing her pale face, sat unmoving on her bedroom floor. Her eyes remained unblinking as she stared off in a place and time that was not of this world. In her hand, a frail parchment was bent around her curled fingers as droplets of salty tears bled into its discolored fibers, soaking in the agony that resided in her frozen-like state.

Charlie placed his hands on either side of her face, his own eyes searching. "Bella? Bella, what's wrong? What happened?"

Though her lips did not move and her tears failed to cease, her statuesque form told him what he needed to know. Because he had seen his daughter like this before and he knew that there was only one cause for the hollow eyes that stared back at him.

He hugged her, strong arms wrapping protectively around her frail body. But she remained unresponsive, lost in memories that forever painted her world in midnight black.

~*~*~

The note was folded and shoved down into the pocket of her jeans. She kept it with her everyday and yet refused to read it. The sight of the classic swoops and curls of his handwriting made her feel as if she couldn't breathe. It made her angry and heartbroken and she wanted nothing more than to shout out that he had failed in his attempt to make it seem as if he never existed.

But who would hear her?

Bright yellow light filtered in through the kitchen window, making her move toward the corner where the shadows called her name.

The crème batter swirled in the glass bowl before her, as she demanded that Jake hand her a bunch of bananas.

"You still won't tell me who called the other day," she insisted. Her hand was finally cast-free, but she still had to be careful when using it. She lightly held the mixing bowl in place. "It was a call to my phone, not yours you know."

Jacob tensed as he placed the bruised bananas by the bowl. "It was no one important."

"Like hell it wasn't!" she yelled, red blinding fury dancing across her eyes. The wooden spoon in her hand was left forgotten in the thickened batter. "Why won't you tell me? If it's not that important, then why can't I know about it?"

His hazelnut eyes drifted to the floor and the sign of guilt that laced its way through the lines of his face told her all she needed to know. "It was… Dr. Cullen."

She blanched, her pale skin becoming the color of sick, translucent death. "What did you say?"

"He wanted to know where Charlie was and I told him he was at the funeral."

She stalked towards him, her chest brushing against his, eyes clouded in angry tears. Words bubbled up her throat, yet she could barely whisper them. Her thin fingers curled and uncurled into tight fists by her sides, itching to collide with his ginger skin. The tears that stung her eyes fell silently down her cheeks.

"You had no right," she seethed, hurt… wounded. "No right."

"I was protecting you."

"Protecting me?" Bella turned, her quiet beauty igniting in flames as she grabbed the glass bowl and threw it to the floor. It smashed in glittering shards, doused in its thick, cream blood.

Jacob shut is eyes, his jaw clenched as the strong remorse flowed through his veins.

"I'm so sick of people protecting me!"

A quiet knock issued from the front door, interrupting her fiery tirade. The both of them turned toward the sound, but before Jacob could move, Bella had pushed past him, her hair whipping against his face in angry lashes.

When she opened the door to a tiny, golden-eyed girl, her heart swelled and burst all at once.

The small pixie held her breath at the sight of the frail ghost before her, whose chocolate waves were ratted and stale. This would be the hardest moment of her immortal life.

"Alice!" Bella squeaked, throwing herself into the vampire's strong arms. Her body would be bruised from the impact, but she couldn't find it in herself to care. This was one piece of her heart, one step closer to the being who made it beat so strongly.

Alice tensed at first, trying her best to memorize the cadence of her friend's soul before it withered away into nothing.

"Bella," she whispered, broken.

The sudden elation Bella had felt was instantly gone. She slowly pulled away from her closest friend with fear. "Alice… what's wrong?"

"I saw you jump," she said. "Off a cliff."

Memories of her short-lived adrenaline rush flashed through her mind and Bella instantly felt her stomach drop. She felt like her only chance to break free from this dark cloud was to fly. But it was all for not. "Yes. Jacob and his friends do it. I thought it would be fun –"

"He thought you were dead. We all did. I didn't see you come out of the water."

The trembling of Alice's voice made her blood run cold. She grabbed her petite, icy arm and drew the pixie inside. Both the vampire and the wolf tensed, but there was little time for pleasantries.

"What do you mean?" Bella demanded, stepping in front of Alice to block Jacob's menacing glare.

"What do you think I mean?" she whimpered. "He took off to Volterra before any one of us could stop him. I never told him of the vision I had, but I did tell Rosalie. And that in itself was a horrific mistake."

Bella shook her head, feeling her skin tingle with dread. She remembered all too well the moment when Edward told her of his planned suicide should anything happen to her. "Alice…"

"He went there to kill himself, Bella. Edward couldn't live in a world where you didn't exist."

"But he… he… didn't love me. He told me – "

"He lied."

"Why didn't he call me? Why did he not check in with me!?"

"Bella, he did," Alice insisted. "But someone told him that there was a funeral."

Salty liquid poured over her eyes as she stared through the watery glass at Jacob, whose gaze refused to meet hers. "What are you telling me, Alice? We can't let him die. I won't allow it."

"Bella…"

She grabbed Alice's hand, tugging her towards the front door. "Come on!"

"He's gone."

Her knees locked as her body came to a halt. She turned to see the tears that clouded Alice's tawny eyes, tears that would never fall.

"He's gone, Bella."

In that moment… there was nothing.

_Stars littered the sky, painting constellations in the midnight heavens. Each one shone and glistened in their own way, making Bella sigh as she felt the cool blades of grass graze her cheek._

"_Tell me why you love me," she whispered._

_Edward turned to her, studying the profile of her delicate face, the slight upturn of her nose, the light dusting of freckles across her cheek. "I love you because you see someone in me that I can't."_

_Their meadow was quiet with the exception of the crickets' symphony that echoed in the night air. _

_Bella turned to face him, her dark eyes glistening beneath the moonlight. "What do you mean?"_

_He sighed, reaching over to trace the swell of her lips with his cold fingers. "You see me as the man and not the monster, Bella. You look past the horrid details of my life and see beauty where I see ash. For the first time in over a hundred years, I feel alive again. That's why I love you."_

"_I always thought you were beautiful, Edward. You know, in a masculine way," she grinned. _

_He chuckled lightly, brushing a strand of her feathery hair behind her ear._

"_But how could you love someone as plain as me?"_

_His sharp inhale and the burning of his coriander eyes set her nerves aflame. "How could you ask me that? You are stunning, Bella. Plain is hardly a description for such a work of art."_

_She snorted at his overly dramatic words but let him continue. "You think I tell you lies, but I could never truly lie to you. Though you would believe every word I say." He smiled, pressing his forehead to hers. "Well, believe me now."_

_She gasped as he kissed her forehead. "You're beautiful here." His lips feathered over the bridge of her nose where they kissed the tip. "And here." His hands cradled her head as he moved his mouth to her closed eyes. "Here." Her cheeks. "Here." The rounded curve of her chin. "And here." And finally down the slope of her neck to her chest, where he placed his hand above her heart. "But you are most beautiful here." He kissed the skin that thrummed wildly beneath his lips and slowly turned his face so that his cold cheek rested upon her warmth. The notes that fluttered to his ears nearly made his heart beat with hers. "You see yourself as plain, but I see a woman whose heart is so pure that she loves those around her without a second thought. You are beautiful, Bella, in every way imaginable. And for as long as I exist in this world, I will love you."_

"Bella."

"No!" She flung herself at the small vampire before her, though Alice kept her hands from smacking against her stone-like flesh. "You're lying! He's not dead, Alice! He can't die!"

"Bella, Bella, Bella," Alice chanted quickly, her eyes wide as she tried to connect with her friend. "Please! I would never lie about this! I'm so sorry!"

"NO!"

Jacob watched the spectacle before him, feeling the piercing pain of a thousand knives stabbing his soul. He knew not what to say or do in that moment as he watched the woman he adored break into a thousand pieces.

"Where's your phone?" she screamed, reaching for Alice's pockets. "I'm going to call him!"

"Bella, he won't answer!" Alice struggled to keep her friend from breaking her arms in her attempt to retrieve her phone.

"Stop it!"

"Bella, listen to me!"

She stopped, her watery eyes focusing in on the alien gaze before her. "He's _gone_. Sweetie, he's gone."

The agony that squeezed her heart made her chin tremble as tortuous cries escaped her lips. Thick, clear fluid ran from her nose as she sniffed and tried to remember how to breathe.

"Oh Bella," Alice wept, her hands slowly releasing Bella's retreating form. "I'm… I'm so sorry."

"Bella," Jacob muttered, his voice cracking.

She turned to him, eyes full of rage as her feet carried her broken body to his hunched form. He opened his mouth to speak and the palm of her hand breathed fire against the side of his face.

~*~*~*~

_Present day…_

Time is what carries us through the day. It counts down the hours into minutes, which turn into seconds and so on. The sky changes from deep purples to cerulean blues, from sun kissed clementines to velvety blacks.

The coolness of the rock warmed beneath her as she watched the sun descend before her eyes. Wrinkled paper and old words filled her hands and wrapped around her fingers, comforting her when nothing else could.

"_It's twilight."_ His voice haunted her, dancing through the air_. "It's the safest time of day for us. The easiest time. But also the saddest, in a way… the end of another day, the return of the night."_

She clutched the piece of paper in her hands as a stray tear produced another worn stain in its thin fibers.

This was the letter she had found in her room while looking for Charlie's receipt. She had refused to read it before she had heard of Edward's death. Now, there wasn't a day that went by where she didn't memorize his written words and let them seep into her heart with warmth and passion.

_Bella,_

_I lied._

_I always told you that you would believe every word I said and so I hope you will believe these words even though you can not hear my voice speaking them to you. One day, you'll find this and I can only hope that you will understand why I left you. It was the hardest thing that I have ever and will ever do. _

_You brought light into the nightmares of my world, but I could no longer bring that darkness upon you. _

_If anything had ever happened to you because of me, I know I would never be able to survive._

_But know that I will always be with you. When the sun sets, and twilight paints the clouds, I will be watching and pretending that you will be doing the same. _

_My heart will always belong to you, Bella. Don't waste your tears over me, nor let life pass by you in my absence. I will always be with you, Bella. Remember that._

Bella smiled through her tears as the burnt siennas and bright crimsons turned into delightful violets. Even in death, she knew Edward loved her. And one day she'd see him again.

She closed her eyes as a cool breeze swept through her hair, kissing her flushed cheeks, and it was as if he was there with her. His fingers swept the strands of her hair away from her neck. She felt his cold lips touch her skin, the tip of his nose gently rubbing against the line of her jaw. His arms wrapped around her small frame, holding her against his strength and love. She felt his lips move against her ear, issuing whispers that danced between the trees and rustled every leaf. They surrounded her. He surrounded her. And in that moment, everything was right. His love was what would keep her going.

She glanced down at the last words written across the letter.

_Just look to the sky and you'll find me._

So she did.

~*~*~*~

The End


End file.
